Chapter 40 Notre Dame de Paris (3) Volume 6 A drop of water, a tear (4)

Four, one drop of water, one tear These few words of the nun can be said to be the meeting point of the two acts.Before that, the two acts played out simultaneously on their own special stages, the one we've just seen, which takes place in the rat hole, and the one we're about to see, which takes place on the shelf of the Post of Shame.The witnesses of the first act are only the three women whom the reader has just met, while the audience of the latter act is the public gathered around the column of shame and the gallows in the river beach square that we have seen before. Seeing the four police officers standing at the four corners of the Pillar of Shame since nine o'clock in the morning, the group expected that the execution would be imminent, probably not by hanging, but by flogging, or ear torture, in short, something.So in an instant, the crowd of onlookers increased sharply and surrounded the four police officers tightly. The four police officers had to use whips and horse buttocks to block more than once, according to the saying at the time, to squeeze the crowd. .

The people waited to watch the public execution, but they kept their heads and didn't seem impatient.When I'm bored, I just watch the column of shame as a pastime.The so-called pillar of shame is actually a very simple stone tablet, in the shape of a cube, about one foot high, with an empty space in the middle.A steep flight of rough stone steps, called a ladder, led to an upper platform on which a turntable of oak planks lay flat.The prisoner was kneeling, with his arms cut behind his back, and was tied to the turntable.There is a winch hidden inside the platform. When the winch rotates, it pushes a wooden wheel shaft, and the wheel rotates accordingly, always keeping on a plane. In this way, the faces of the prisoners are continuously presented in front of the audience. Every corner can be seen.This is called car-turned-criminal.

As one can see, as far as entertainment is concerned, the pillars of shame in the beach square are far less fun than those in the vegetable market.There is no trace of architectural artistry, no star of grandeur.You can't see the roof with iron cross, you can't see the octagonal lamp, you can't see the flower-shaped brackets and leaf-shaped brackets on the top of the delicate small columns on the straight eaves competing for beauty, and you can't see the strange and mysterious water tanks and exquisite Carved roof trusses and exquisite stone carvings. If you want to see it, you have to look at the four walls of gravel, the top and bottom of the sandstone platform, and the gallows with a fierce-looking stone pillar next to it, shriveled and naked.

For those who love Gothic architecture, this kind of pleasure is a bit of a shame.It is true that those idlers in the Middle Ages who liked to watch the scene had no interest in any buildings, so they didn't care whether the pillar of shame was beautiful or not. The prisoner, strapped to the back of a cart, finally arrived.Then he was dragged onto the platform, and he could be seen from all sides of the square being firmly tied to the turntable of the column of shame by ropes and leather thongs.Everyone recognized at a glance that he was Quasimodo. Sure enough, it was him.It's incredible that he's back this time.Yesterday in the same square, accompanied by the Duke of Egypt, King Dina, and Emperor Galilee, all the people cheered and saluted him, and made him Pope of Fools, but today he is a prisoner on the pillar of shame!What is certain is that no one in the crowd, not even Quasimodo himself, alternately victorious and criminal, had clearly in his mind this contemplation of the different situations before and after.Nor did Gringoire and his philosophy of life experience such a scene.

After a while, Michel Noiré, the trumpeter appointed by our Majesty the King, asked everyone to be silent, and read the verdict at the top of his voice according to the ruling and order of the magistrate.Afterwards, he led his men in armor to retreat behind the big cart. Quasimodo was expressionless, not even frowning.Any resistance was out of the question, and in the stylistic parlance of criminal justice, the bondage was unrelenting and solid, meaning that the straps and chains were likely to sink right into the flesh.Besides, this is a tradition of prisons and torture ships that has not disappeared, and in a civilized, gentle, and humane people like ours, does not the shackles still cherish this tradition as a treasure (by the way, bitter Yakuza and guillotine are examples)!

Quasimodo allowed himself to be dragged, pushed, carried, carried, tied and tied. Nothing could be guessed from his expression but that of savage or idiot amazement.He was known to be deaf, and seemed to be blind. People push him on the roulette and kneel down, he is at the mercy of others, he kneels when he wants to; people strip off his jacket and shirt until he is naked, and he is at his mercy, let him take it off if he wants to; He Huankou tied him up again, but he was still at his mercy, and if he wanted to be tied up, he would be tied up.I saw him panting heavily from time to time, like a calf tied to a butcher's cart, with his head drooping on the side of the cart and dangling back and forth.

"The fool!" said John Frollo of the Mill to his friend Robin Puspin (the two students had come here with the prisoner as a matter of course). "He's just a beetle in a box and doesn't understand anything!" The audience burst into laughter at the sight of Quasimodo's naked hunchback, chicken breasts, calloused and hairy shoulders.When everyone was overjoyed, a stubby man in livery climbed up on the platform and walked over to stop beside the prisoner.Immediately word spread among the masses that this man was Monsieur Pierre Totrulu, the legal executioner of the Château.

He first put a black hourglass in a corner of the column of shame.The bottle at the top of the hourglass is filled with red sand, which leaks down into the container at the bottom.Then he took off the two-color coat on his body, and saw a slender leather whip twisted with long white leather strips hanging from his right hand. It was shiny with oil, full of bumps, and had some metal claws at the end.With his left hand he casually lifted the sleeve of the shirt on his right arm, up to the armpit. At this moment John Frollo climbed onto Robin Puspin's shoulders, thrust his fair curly head over the crowd, and called out: "Gentlemen and ladies, come and see!" ! Here soon will be imperiously whipped my brother Monsieur Joza's bell-ringer Quasimodo, a monster of oriental architecture, whose back is a dome, and whose legs are crooked columns!"

As soon as the words fell, the crowd laughed, especially the children and girls. At last, the executioner stamped his foot, and the wheel immediately began to spin.Quasimodo, bound firmly, swayed a little.The deformed face suddenly turned pale with panic, and the audience around laughed even harder. As soon as the rotating roulette sent Quasimodo's hump to Master Pierre, Master Pierre raised his right arm, and the slender leather strap was like a poisonous snake, making a harsh hissing sound in the air, and whipping him fiercely. On that poor wretch's shoulder. Quasimodo woke up suddenly, his body jumped involuntarily, and then he gradually understood.He shrank back into the rope in pain, and the muscles in his face twitched violently from surprise and pain, and his face changed.But he didn't groan, just threw his head back, turned to the left, swerved to the left again, and swayed like a bull wagging his head and tail in pain when a gadfly stung him in the ribs.

Followed by the second whip, the third whip, one whip after another, continuously.The roulette kept spinning, the whip kept falling like raindrops, and blood burst out immediately, streaks of blood dripped from the hunchback's dark shoulders, and when the slender leather strip swung in the air, the blood splashed everywhere and splashed into the crowd . Quasimodo returned to his former indifference, at least outwardly.He didn't show his face at first, and he didn't see any movement on the outside, but secretly he was struggling to break the shackles on his body.His one eye was shining, his muscles tensed, his limbs curled up, his belts and chains pulled tight.The struggle was powerful, wonderful, and hopeless.However, the old shackles of the judicial office are very strong, just a rattling, that's all.Quasimodo was exhausted and fell over again.

The expression on his face suddenly changed from astonishment to pain and frustration.He closed his one eye, and his head dropped to his chest, as if dying. Then, he stopped moving.No matter whether he was bleeding profusely, whether the whip was more severe than the whip, whether the executioner who was getting more and more excited and intoxicated by the power of execution was furious, or the terrible leather whip that was sharper than the devil's claws and made a sharper neighing sound was whistling endlessly, Nothing could make him move again. As soon as the execution began, a bailiff in black and riding a black horse was standing by the ladder.At this moment, he stretched out the ebony stick in his hand and pointed to the hourglass.Only then did the executioner stop, and the turntable also stopped.Quasimodo slowly opened his eyes again. The flogging was over.Two servants of the legal executioner came to wipe the blood on the prisoner's shoulders and back, applied some kind of ointment that could heal all kinds of wounds at once, and threw a yellow shawl in the shape of a sacrificial cloak on his back. cloth.At the same moment, Pierre Totruu shook his whip, which was soaked and red with blood, and the blood fell in drops on the stone floor. As for Quasimodo, the matter was not closed, and an hour had to be displayed on the stage, which was in addition to the judgment of Monsieur Robert d'Estouteville, which Monsieur Florent Barberdian had so wisely delivered. Additional.Recalling that Jean de Cumena said that deafness is absurd really puts a lot of light on this old jest of physiology and psychology. So he turned the hourglass over again, and left the bound hunchback on the scaffold, so that the punishment could be carried through to the end. Folks, especially in the Middle Ages, were in society what children are in the family.As long as they remain in a state of primitive ignorance, in a state of spiritual and intellectual immaturity, the words that describe children can be used to describe them: There is no empathy at this age. It can be seen from our previous narration that Quasimodo is full of resentment and hatred, and there are more than one reasons for resentment, which is not false.Almost everyone in the crowd had reason, or thought he had reason, to complain about the hunchbacked villain Notre-Dame.At first seeing him appearing on the pedestal of shame, everyone rejoiced and rejoiced; then seeing him being tortured and his horrible condition after being tortured, instead of pitying him, everyone added a little bit of joy, and their resentment became more bitter. As soon as the indictment was over, it was the turn of a thousand private vengeances, in the jargon still used by those judges in square hats.Here, too, as in the Hall of Justice, the women were particularly violent, and all of them harbored a certain hatred for Quasimodo, some for his cunning, some for his ugliness, and the latter were the worst. He gritted his teeth with hatred. "Pooh! Antichrist ugly thing!" cried one. "The devil on the broomstick!" cried another. "What a pretty face!" said a third. "If today were yesterday, with this grimace, I would be the Madman Pope!" "Good!" said an old woman. "That's the face on the stake. When will we see him make faces on the gallows?" "You damn bell ringer, when will you hold that big bell of yours under the nine fountains?" "It's the devil who's ringing the three-hour clock!" "Bah! Deaf! One-eyed! Hunchbacked! Ugly!" "This ugly look can scare pregnant women into miscarriages, and any doctor or pharmacist who performs abortions will have to bow down!" At this point, the two students, John of the Mill and Robin Puspin, sang at the top of their voices the refrain of the old folk song: a twisted rope Hang the hanged sinner! bundle of firewood Burn the ugly fellow! All kinds of other cursing, suddenly like a downpour; hissing, cursing, laughter, all in one piece; here and there, stones are flying. Quasimodo, though deaf, saw clearly, and the public's anger was as strong as its words.What's more, the stones that hit you can be heard more clearly than the laughter. At first he held on.However, the endurance that used to clenched its teeth to resist the executioner's whip gradually weakened under the stings of these insects, and it could no longer withstand it.The bulls of Asturia, almost indifferent to the matador's attack, were enraged by dogs barking and throwing spears. He looked around the crowd slowly with threatening eyes at first, but because he was bound tightly, his eyes were not enough to drive away the swarm of flies that were biting his wound. So regardless of the ropes and ties, he struggled violently and twisted furiously, making the old wheel rattle on the wooden shaft.In this regard, the ridicule and insults became more fierce. Unable to break his chains, the miserable figure, like a wild beast in chains, calmed down again.Only now and then he let out an angry sigh, and his whole chest swelled up.There was no shame on his face.He has always been too far away from the social state, and too close to the natural state, so he doesn't know what shame is.Besides, he is deformed to such an extent, whether he is ashamed or not, how can he tell it?However, anger, hatred, and despair slowly covered this ugly face with a cloud. It became darker and full of electricity, and the eye of the Cyclops burst out with the light of thousands of lightning bolts. At this moment, a priest came through the crowd on a mule, and Quasimodo's clouded face brightened for a moment.He caught a glimpse of the mule and the priest from afar, and the poor prisoner's countenance suddenly brightened, and a strange smile appeared on his face, which had been tense with anger, full of indescribable tenderness, tolerance, and affection.As the priest got closer, the smile became clearer, more distinct, and more radiant.The unfortunate man was greeted as if by a savior, but when the mule had approached the pillar of shame and the rider could see who the culprit was, the priest lowered his eyes, snapped back, kicked his spurs, and hurried away. As if anxious to get out of the way, afraid of some request from the ugly monster, he didn't care whether a poor wretch in such a position paid tribute or appreciated it. This priest was the Archdeacon, Don Claude Frollo. Quasimodo's countenance was clouded again, and darkened even more.Although there is still a smile mixed in the cloud for a while, it is a bitter smile, a discouraged smile, and an infinitely sad smile. Time passed.He had been there at least an hour and a half, broken, insulted, mocked, and almost stoned to death. Suddenly, with double despair, regardless of the shackles on his body, he struggled desperately again, even the entire wooden roulette frame under him was shaken.He had been silent all this time, but now he broke the silence, his voice was hoarse and ferocious, it sounded like a dog bark rather than a human bark, overwhelmed the ridicule of the crowd, and only heard a roar: "Water!" This tragic cry, not only failed to impress the sympathy of the masses, but added a joke to the kind-hearted people in Paris surrounding the scaffold.It should be noted that this rabble, taken as a whole, was no less cruel and stupid than that terrible gang of beggars.We have taken readers to meet them before, and that group of people is the lowest level of the people through and through.After the unfortunate sinner's cry of thirst, nothing but cynicism echoed around him.It is true to say that his appearance at this moment is not only pitiful, but also ridiculous and annoying.His face was flushed purple, he was sweating profusely, his eyes were bewildered, his mouth was foaming from anger and pain, and most of his tongue was sticking out.It must also be noted that if, among this mob of townspeople, some well-meaning man or woman would be kind enough to offer a glass of water to the wretched wretch, there would be such a A disgraceful and shameless prejudice is enough to deter even the good-hearted. After a while, Quasimodo looked around the crowd with despairing eyes, and shouted again in an even more heartbreaking voice: "Water!" There was another burst of laughter. "Drink this!" cried Robin Puspin, throwing a rag soaked in the gutter in his face. "Take it, you deaf man! I owe it to you!" A woman threw a stone at his head: "Taste this for you, and see if you dare to ring the death bell in the middle of the night and wake us up!" "Hey, boy!" howled a lame man, struggling to beat him with his cane. "Do you still dare to cast magic on us from the top of the bell tower of Notre Dame?" "Here's a bowl to draw water for you!" cried a man, throwing a broken crock pot at his chest, "My wife gave birth to a baby with two heads just because you walked by." Cub!" "And my cat gave birth to a kitten with six legs!" An old woman screamed as she picked up a tile and threw it at him. "Water!" cried Quasimodo a third time, out of breath. At this moment, he saw a strangely dressed girl step out of the crowd, with a little white goat with golden horns beside her and a Basque tambourine in her hand. Quasimodo's eyes lit up immediately.This was the gypsy girl he had tried so hard to steal last night.He was vaguely aware that it was for this attack that he was being punished at this very moment.Far from it, he was punished only because he had the bad luck of being deaf, and a deaf man judged him.He had no doubt that the gipsy girl had come to take revenge, and had come to beat him like the others. Sure enough, she quickly climbed the steps.He was so angry and remorseful that he couldn't even breathe.He wished he could knock down the platform of the pillar of shame at once. If his one eye could be struck by lightning, he would blow the Egyptian girl into pieces without waiting for her to climb the platform. Without a word, she approached the sinner, who wriggled in an attempt to avoid her, and unfastened a water jug ​​from her girdle, and gently brought it to the wretch's chapped lips. At this time, he saw a large teardrop rolling in his dry and anxious eyes, and then slowly flowing down the ugly face that had been wrinkled for a long time due to disappointment.The unfortunate man shed tears, perhaps for the first time in his life. However, he forgot to drink water.The Egyptian girl pursed her lips impatiently, and with a smile on her face, she pressed the jug close to Quasimodo's open mouth. He was so thirsty that he drank in one gulp after another. As soon as he had finished drinking, the poor man stretched out his smudged lips, as if he wanted to kiss the beautiful hand that had just rescued him.However, the girl might be on guard, and remembering the attempted atrocity last night, she quickly withdrew her hand in fright like a child afraid of being bitten by a wild animal. And the poor deaf man stared at her with reproachful eyes and inexpressible sadness. Such a beautiful woman, so delicate, pure, charming, yet so delicate, came to rescue such a miserable, ugly, and vicious fellow with such sincerity. This may be a touching scene in the world, especially when it happened at the Column of Shame It's unparalleled. All the people were moved by it. They applauded and shouted: "It's wonderful! It's wonderful!" Precisely at this moment, the hermit nun saw the Egyptian girl standing on the pedestal of shame from the window of the burrow, and immediately cursed bitterly: "You should be cut to pieces, Egyptian girl! Cut to pieces! Cut to pieces!" Cut to pieces!"